A receptionist speaks on a phone under a Sony Corp logo at the company's headquarters in Tokyo, in this file picture taken February 6, 2014. Sponsors Adidas, Sony, Visa and Coca-Cola on June 8, 2014 called on soccer's rulers to deal thoroughly with allegations of bribery to secure the 2022 World Cup for Qatar, an issue overshadowing this week's kickoff in Brazil.
REUTERS/Toru Hanai

On Tuesday, Sony launched Xperia C3 in China, marketing the device as the "world's best selfie smartphone." The mid-range Sony Xperia C3 will hit the store shelves in August. The Samsung Galaxy Grand 2, on the other hand, was released in the first quarter of 2014 and was received with positive reviews. With the brand new Sony Xperia C3's specifications out, it is time for specs, features and price comparison between the aforementioned devices.

Display, Exterior and Size

The Sony Xperia C3 features a whopping LG G3-like 5.5 inches IPS LCD display, with a modest resolution of 720 x 1,280 pixels. Whereas the Samsung Galaxy Grand 2 features a relatively smaller 5.25 inches TFT display, with the same screen resolution as the Xperia C3. The pixel density of the Xperia C3 stands at 267 ppi, which is slightly lesser than the 280 ppi of Galaxy Grand 2.

The Galaxy Grand 2 comes with a faux-leather design that is prevalent in the Galaxy Note 3. In addition, the plastic material used for the overall design gives a cheaper look to the handset. However, as Phone Arena points out, the faux-leather is any time better looking than the glossy plastic look of many other Samsung phones. Notably, the patterned rear does not get stained easily and feels comfortable on the hands. Even though, the colours are vivid and zippy on the display, the viewing angles and over-saturation are note-worthy problem areas.

However, there is not much information available on the form factor used in the selfie-centric Sony Xperia C3. The handset does come with Triluminos display technology that is synonymous with Sony handsets and mobile BRAVIA Engine 2. This combination provides the Xperia handsets with better colour and image reproduction.

The thickness and the weight of Sony Xperia C3 are 0.30 inches and 149 g respectively. The Samsung Galaxy Grand 2, on the other hand, comes with a thickness of 0.35 inches and a weight of 163 g. Hence the Xperia handset is both thinner and lighter.

Hardware, Software and Memory

Both the handsets are powered by the same quad-core (Qualcomm Snapdragon 400) Cortex-A7 processor, clocked at 1.2 GHz. While the Samsung Galaxy Grand 2 comes with a good 1.5 GB of RAM, the Xperia C3 settles for 1 GB of RAM. Also, the Xperia C3 runs on Android v4.4.2 KitKat OS, whereas the Samsung Galaxy Grand 2 runs on Android v4.3 JellyBean OS that is upgradable to higher versions.

Both the phones come with 8 GB of internal storage capacity with microSD card support for further expansion. However, the expansion limit of Xperia C3 stands at 32 GB, while the Galaxy Grand 2 stands at 64 GB.

Camera

Both the phones house the same 8 MP of rear-facing cameras with LED flash. The Xperia C3 sports a surprisingly good 5 MP front-facing camera with a frontal LED flash, staying true to the name "world's best selfie smartphone." The Samsung Galaxy Grand 2, meanwhile, sports a relatively lower 1.9 MP rear-facing camera unit.

Along with the frontal LED flash, the Xperia C3 also provides an 80 degree target view. Moreover, selfies can be taken in multiple ways, a Smile Shutter function lets the selfie to be captured with just a smile and the other way is to tap twice on the back of the handset.

Battery

The device from Sony houses a solid non-removable 2500 mAh battery unit, while the Samsung Galaxy Grand 2 features a relatively better 2600 mAh battery unit. The Xperia C3 can provide up to 25 hours of 3G talk-time and a whopping 1000 hours of 3G stand-by time, while the Galaxy Grand 2 can give up to 17 hours of 3G talk-time and only 370 hours of 3G stand-by time, says GSMArena.

The Samsung Galaxy Grand 2 can be purchased for AU$369.95 in Australia. Although, official price is yet to be announced, an Indian Web site named PriceIn says Sony Xperia C3 will be priced at 22,999 INR in India that roughly translates to AU$409.